IIT Bombay initiated a social endeavour project “Localization of Solar Energy through Local Assembly, Sale and Usage of 1 Million Solar Study Lamps” with sanction received from Government of India’s Ministry of Finance’s National Clean Energy Fund (NCEF) through Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) for partial financial support. The cost of the solar study lamp is Rs.500. Of this amount, Rs.180/lamp is contributed by the National Clean Energy Fund (NCEF), Rs.120/ lamp is paid by the student beneficiary, and Philanthropic Partners like; state governments, trust, CSRs and individuals contribute Rs. 200/ lamp. Currently the project is spread over the states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Odisha, covering, 24 districts, 53 talukas, and 8,000+ villages, in coordination with 9 NGO partners. There are a total of 42 assembly centers in active operation and more than 850 manpower trained by IIT Bombay, working on this project. We have already distributed more than 6.5 Lakh lamps, as of January 2014.

Sustainability of a solar lamps program not only depends on making solar lamps available, but also making them work for the lifetime of 1 Million SoUL program of IIT Bombay. The program is designed to make rural people capable of assembly, distribution and repair & maintenance of solar lamps. In this process, IIT Bombay has already identified the local assemblers and distributors who were involved in the lamp assembly & distribution, to act as repair center managers. IIT Bombay calls these centers as SoUL Repair Centers (SRCs) which are identified, roughly for every 3000 lamps distributed. So far in this project IITB have established more than 150 SRCs, whose details along with their geographical coordinates will soon be given state wise & district wise under the R&M tab.

The idea behind setting up of SRCs, together with their repair activity they would be able to sell other solar products at commercial rates, promoting solar technology by market mechanism. These managers have enough skills to understand the working of solar technology and repair of solar lamps. New solar products can be introduced with the additional training on those products. Vendors are encouraged to sell new products through these SRCs. One can contact them directly in their local areas, a list of currently established SRCs with coordinates Click here.

Disclaimer: IIT Bombay will only provide information available about the Institutional Partners (IPs) and SoUL Repair Centers (SRCs) associated to the 1 Million SoUL project for introducing to the manufacturers to promote their products. IIT Bombay will not be responsible for any transaction being done between the parties (IPs, SRCs and manufacturers). IIT Bombay assumes no liability for any loss of any kind that might arise in dealing between the parties involved. IIT Bombay also assumes no liability for improper or incorrect use of material or information between parties.